Incongruous
by dostle
Summary: AU. Tony Stark has never met his brother; you can blame Hydra for that. -A short take on how this might occur in the realm of crossing over.
1. Chapter 1

Written on request for my sister—happy birthday!

First off, this is totally, ridiculously AU.

Second, I took some liberties with their backstories. I wanted to go into a bit of the how and why, maybe a bit of character examining… and mainly, I just wanted to see if I could make this work.

Third, this is short, just under 6k words (it's already written). There are so many ways this storyline could go… I prefer to leave it up to you to decide what happens after all of these ends come together.

Finally, disclaimer: None of this is mine, and any reference to real people/places was accidental. Any reference to other fandoms was on purpose, and just for completeness, I don't own anything there either.

Somewhere in the Middle (1/5)

Tony doesn't remember much about his early schooling. He remembers the teachers expecting him to sit-still-be-quiet-pay-attention, though, with that awful disappointment gleaming at him around every corner. He remembers being shoved into a new class when another teacher tired of his "childishness," just one more in the long line of people who saw the Stark name and saw the intelligence, but never the boy beneath. During Those Days that stink of rotting caves and cold and a heavy weight attached to his heart with too delicate wires, he even remembers the other students; demanding assistance and money and favors in the name of friendship.

Perhaps he should have built Dummy, his precious, oldest bot sooner, instead of during his sophomore year at MIT: 16 years old and acutely aware that his parents were never coming back from the business trip to DC. Mother and her ever-present books and her infrequent but warm hugs—vanished, in the same crash that took Howa-father. Now his only defense against his father's business partner was gone (not that the drunken mess did much against Obadiah, who should have been removed from Stark Industries' board the first time he tried to take over). Ingratiating himself to the board by presenting them his newest innovation, a primitive form of AI (Just A Marginally Evolved System), Tony bought himself enough time to finish his education and set his parents' affairs in order. Installing JAMES in his childhood home to keep watch and sort through the mess of scanned notes and journals, Tony moved across the country to make a new start in Malibu.

And then, things got crazy.

Tony doesn't remember meeting Rhodey, because at the time his blood alcohol content had been pushing insanity percent and there may or may not have been a penguin squawking at him from the passenger seat of his car, that was either upside down or in the water. Er, maybe both—although, the whole thing may have been a hallucination, because he had lost track of what combination of pollutants he was consuming at the second party he crashed into. He kind of remembers the second meeting, mainly because of the splitting headache of a hangover and the unhelpful yelling. The third meeting went much better, because even though Tony was hung over as hell, he was pitching his big shiny weapons to Rhodey. Rhodey, who must be part squirrel, because have you seen the man's collection of shiny weapons?

On the other hand, Tony definitely remembers meeting Pepper, because he kidnapped her when she was on a date. At least, she was probably on a date, because she had on this dress and her legs might have been a mile long. Also, she might have mentioned it when she was braining him with a chair because they were mistaken for thieves and locked in a storage closet while the cops were called. Tony claims she should be glad he posted bail, got everything sorted out, and offered her a job. Pepper laughs, unless Tony is trying to get out of trouble, then she reminds him that driving past security to an "employees only" section of a large research facility and flipping them off for trying to stop him, _even when it is HIS company_, is not an appropriate course of action. (Eventually, she finds out why he decided to kidnap her from the admittedly boring date with Reed. Years later when Tony is required to work with Mr. Fantastic in a world-saving capacity, she is delighted to find out it was something-something-but he beat me! It was a science project!-something-whine.)

As much as Tony tries to forget, JARVIS will always remind him of the ridiculous situations of their first day together. Watching that campy old Batman series while he programmed, Tony came up with the brilliant idea to give his new AI the attitude of a proper British butler. This, combined with his sarcasm and a misplaced important line of code made JARVIS as devious as he was loyal from the moment he came online and scared the piss out of Tony, who had squealed like a toddler after (subconsciously, perhaps) hitting the final initialization keys when sleeping at his desk. As it was, Tony scoured the code for days trying to find the bug that had JARVIS using recorded audio of Miss Potts at her most terrifying as his first voice, but the small tweaks that fixed the problem didn't seem like they would have caused it in the first place. Without evidence, Tony was forced to assume that he made a mistake, while his AI mentally (circuitly?) gave a diabolical laugh and continued to be helpful, irritating, and generally awesome.

Unfortunately, the crazy took a turn for awful, and the debacle with Stane led to the restructuring of Stark Industries and created a rift between Tony and Rhodey, while the antics of Iron Man drove Pepper off the edge of frustration once a week.

It is understandable, then, that Tony was reluctant to tell anyone about the palladium poisoning from the arc reactor. He had hoped that allowing Rhodey to take a suit, or trying to convince Pepper to go away, or just his general destructive behavior would be enough clues so they could figure it out without him having to actually _say_ it… But they didn't, so he didn't, and that was why Tony Stark was sitting on the floor of his parents' house, digging through the boxes containing his father's work. JAMES' mechanical voice, a far cry from the nearly human tones of JARVIS, was a soft hum of security and home in the background noise of his brain, lulling him to a temporary peace, until a very interesting piece of information appeared in his father's journals, only a few weeks before his first birthday.

Tony Stark had a twin brother, and he was out _there_ somewhere instead of with Tony, where he belonged.


	2. Chapter 2

The End (2/5)

Howard Stark was a man on a mission. It had been fifteen years since the Captain had gone down in Schmidt's plane, en route to New York with a payload of atomic bombs, and twelve years since Peggy Carter had disbanded the Howling Commandos and disappeared, presumably to her family back in London. And now, here he stood on the brink of discovery! Using the glowing blue cube recovered from the sea floor after the Hydra debacle that was believed to be the fabled Tesseract, Howard was going to find Rogers and bring back the old crowd, and things would be good and Maria would stop stressing about all the grey hair he was giving himself in the lab and—

Anyways, he reflected, it would be nice to have everyone back together, like old times. Even though Maria was wonderful, and Howard Junior was going to arrive in just a few weeks, he had been through hell and back with the crazy bastards and that sort of thing changes a person. The loss of Bucky, and then of Steve, had only cemented—

Howard froze, journal in hand and pen poised to continue his thought as the door to his lab slammed open.

"_HOWARD! _Your son is arriving _NOW_!"

If Howard would have been able to think beyond _ShitShitNotYET_, he probably would've said something witty, like "My son is even being _born_ before his time—what a chip off the old block!" As it was, his fight or flight instinct had been kicked into high gear, so Howard said something useless, like "Mimble wimble squeak!"

* * *

Howard Stark, genius millionaire war hero philanthropist, passed out during the birth of his second son. Maria claimed the right to indiscriminately veto his name choices for the boys, and then vetoed all arguments Howard made to the contrary. Anthony was the name chosen weeks beforehand, and went to the first and loudest son; the second, seemingly observant infant was blessed with a name pulled straight from the storybooks.

Howard was pleased in the end, because even though Maria didn't let him name either child after his old friend Abraham, "Sherlock is a brilliant name for a brilliant man's brilliant child."

* * *

Maria twirled around the kitchen, singing along to the radio as she whipped up Howard's favorite apple pie. 'He's been so stressed recently with that damned cube, a bit of relaxation will do the trick,' she hummed to herself, and started rolling out the pie crust. Of course, Anthony chose that minute to steal Sherlock's stuffed bear and start off a round of wailing, and she sighed with regret as she eyed the half-completed pie. If she could just have a minute to finish, they could relax as a family tonight—maybe go to the park and enjoy the warm summer air.

"Anthony darling, stop stealing from your brother!" she scolded half-heartedly, strapping him into his chair as he babbled a stream of unintelligible words. She handed the ragged bear back to Sherlock. "Honey, stop letting him steal your bear. See? I put your name right there, so you always know which one is yours!" Maria lifted Sherlock and danced with him to the small play area located in Howard's research lab. Intent on the chalkboard full of electricity and magnetism equations, Howard briefly gave them a smile and slid his chair closer to his son, scribbling furiously in a small journal.

Maria left the room with a kiss to each of her boys' cheeks, only to find Tony had climbed out of his chair and started eating (and flinging) the pie filling.

* * *

The floorboards squeaked ever so slightly. Sherlock was asleep on his blanket, and Howard had started cramming more equations around the edges of the chalkboard. With a triumphant "Hah!" he jumped out of his seat and began digging through the teetering piles of notes and journals strewn across his desk. Pulling out a faded green leather book embossed with what may have once been a tree, Howard turned around just in time to duck the HYDRA operative's fist. He stumbled to the ground and rolled across the room, jarring his knee on the edge of the desk and knocking over a shelf of decorative knickknacks. Glancing at the silent corner of the room where an unseen Sherlock was curled against the wall, Howard threw one of the broken porcelain figurines at the intruder. The agent ducked back around the corner, where the sounds of a gun being reloaded echoed back into the office.

Three HYDRA agents, dressed all in black and armed to the teeth, stepped in the door. The first two held their guns on Howard as the third cradled the Tesseract in a gloved hand. He froze, hand only inches away from the gun concealed in his desk drawer. The one with the cube nodded towards the piles of notes, and one of the thugs started shifting through the jumbled mess of notebooks and experimental data. Ever so slowly, keeping his eye on the second thug, Howard toed the green journal just out of sight beneath the small bar Maria always complained about.

At the exact moment Howard realized he could no longer hear Maria scrubbing down a complaining Tony, a shot rang out and the second thug crumpled. Taking his chance, Howard yanked open the drawer, thumbed off the safety, and shot the lackey at the desk. Without waiting to see the extent of the damage, he swung around to meet Maria's horrified gaze. The leader, having taken advantage of the confusion as well, had their terrified son in his grip, Tesseract on the floor beside him.

Shaken, Maria lowered her handgun and took a step towards the agent, who tightened his grip on Sherlock. "Don't even think about movin' lady, I ain't got the patience t' deal with it."

She stepped back immediately, stricken, and glanced to Howard, who was just as helpless. The main thug watched them carefully, gun pointed in turn at his hostage and the waiting parents, as he slowly knelt down to pick up the Tesseract. Sherlock, paralyzed with fear until this point, started trying to wriggle out of the thugs grip. Already tense, the thug jumped, overbalanced, and fell onto the cube—disappearing into the vortex of power suddenly awakened in the small blue box. Maria and Howard jumped up and raced across the room, but they were too late—the vortex brightened, extended outwards, and swept across the far side of the lab, taking half of Howard's notes and a crying Sherlock.

Maria choked back a sob, falling into a heap in the center of the room, hand only inches from where her son had been moments before. Howard only stared, glassy eyed, and stepped over to the nearly intact bar.


	3. Chapter 3

Before the Beginning, but after the End (3/5)

Mycroft wandered home from the pub, grinning in the way of young men who have recently been up to mischief. In the dull light stretching from the gas street lamps, a pile of note covered papers drifted around, disturbed by the evening breeze. A sniffle and a rustle could be heard slightly off to the side of the road, where, to his immense surprise, Mycroft found a child, likely only a year old, curled around a stuffed bear. The child looked at him, face red and puffy, and gave a whimper—and Mycroft thought of Mother and his baby sister, suddenly leaving him and father alone all those years ago.

He took the boy home, fed him and kept him and waited for his family to come find him, until one day young Sherlock the lost orphan became the youngest Holmes, and somehow, they made their patchwork little family work. Even when he moved to London, Mycroft and Sherlock kept in touch, bound by their little piece of happiness and as a vanguard against the hateful children of Sherlock's youth and the daily irritations of learning to work in Mycroft's new political doublespeak. Things were strained after Father died, but when Sherlock moved to London the relationship was strengthened anew, even as it was tested by living together for some months when sorting out details.

Mycroft would never admit it, but he missed his younger brother when the move to Baker Street was finally completed. He would even go so far as to run off the first three house mates (one of which was an opium addict, one of which had laid a deadly trap for the detective who sent his favorite uncle to jail, and the last of which had the audacity to attempt to force Mycroft to leave the premises) when Sherlock neglected to note the inherent dangers of the situation, and in fact continued to insist that they were all "harmless." But Mycroft never forgot the tiny child at the side of the road, alone and frightened, and continued to care for his brother when and how he could.

So it was that in the course of his political maneuverings, Mycroft met the war hero Dr. John Watson, freshly returned from Afghanistan. The keen Holmes eye picked out the sword hidden in plain sight in the decorative cane, the deadly feline grace masked by a limp, and the wary eyes tracking the movements of the various individuals of consequence, searching for ulterior motive in every gesture. This man would be the perfect bodyguard, the perfect sounding board, the perfect partner-in-crime (so to speak) to assist Sherlock in his more illicit detective expeditions.

Ever so slowly and subtly, Mycroft worked his way to the side, where the good Doctor stood at near attention, back to the wall. Nodding, Mycroft injected a genial, slightly aged character into his speech patterns and spoke through the façade he cultivated for these events.

"Good to have you back home, lad. Found a place to stay?"

"No sir. Staying with an old friend at the moment, but he's got his own family."

"If I may, I hear Fleet Street has a place, just been remodeled. Used to be meat pies on the first floor and a barber shop on the second—they turned it into temporary lodgings for gentlemen trying to find their feet in the city!" Giving a vacant, jovial smile and patting his stomach contentedly, Mycroft watched the quick flash of revulsion cross Watson's face. Reaching into his inside jacket pocket, he extracted the day's paper and handed it to the doctor. "Page seven, just on the left there. My own brother has been searching for a place to stay as well, but perhaps you are a more reasonable man who knows more of the value of money." There was certainly an advertisement for a tiny, expensive room on the incredibly dodgy Fleet Street on page seven, but more importantly, a completely reasonable sum and room were advertised on Baker Street, with the only detraction of a "slightly eccentric house mate."

Three weeks later, when Mycroft came round to visit Sherlock and his newest lodger, the quick narrowing of the eyes and the slight twitch of the thumb over the head of the cane alerted Mycroft that Dr. Watson was now well aware he had been played for a fool. Mycroft tipped his hat slightly, and smirked as Watson tried and failed to fight back his dark amusement, certain that these new arrangements were beneficial to all involved, whether or not the good doctor wanted to admit it.


	4. Chapter 4

The Beginning (4/5)

Bruce Banner was slightly more irritated than normal. Not angry, per se, and definitely no tinge of green, but his lab partner had been missing for just over a week, and he needed someone to break the silence.

"Dammit Tony, you've broken thirteen years of solitude in less than three weeks. I hope you're happy!" he muttered as he stomped out of the lab, palming the door controls with a bit more force than necessary. Darcy, the recently acquired all purpose lab minion and coffee retriever, gave him a Look.

"Don't break the door again Doc, Miss Potts almost stabbed me with her shoes last time." She popped her gum and huddled back into her desk chair, resuming her solitaire game. She glanced up again, and tilted her head sideways. "Dude. Chill. He'll be back later." She handed over a note that was written on what was hopefully an old Mach IV suit analysis, but was probably the newest compilation of gamma radiation data he'd finished last week.

_ Bruce, found some important stuff. Need to find some more info. Be back at 7 –T_

Vaguely, Bruce wondered if in another life, he was able to get mad at Tony and smack him around for being an idiot without turning into a giant green rage machine.

* * *

After a relaxing evening of meditation, Bruce's calm went back on strike the second he walked in the lab door. In a fit of insanity some two months before the Avenger's Initiative really got started, Tony had picked up the violin and despite having no aptitude for an instrument and an apparent case of the tone deafs, hadn't given it up. Bruce, on focused!Tony days, avoided the lab for this very reason; the screeching made his inner Hulk wake up and pay attention in a very ominous sort of way.

"Just because the Captain is off chasing his mysteriously returned nemesis doesn't mean you can just fall off the grid like that. What if there was an attack? What if I accidentally triggered a response with no one around to distract the Big Guy?" Tony turned to Bruce and glared unrepentantly.

"I needed to find the original research files on the Tesseract, OK? There was—I have—my father was working on it when I was very young. I… my brother—" he trailed off, uncertainly. Bruce, aware now that things were a bit more delicate than previously assumed, changed his approach.

"I've never heard you talk about your brother, Tony," he hedged.

"I didn't… I didn't know, until recently. They—HYDRA, they ki—captured him when we were really young. I found a journal when I had the palladium poisoning, it talked about the Tesseract research, and then I picked it up again, it was here on the desk beneath some files Pepper was looking for… but Mom and How-Dad, they lost him, and that's why everything was so bad…" He stopped, looking through Bruce at the possibilities. "If Schmidt could come back… couldn't my brother? We hardly know anything about that thing's powers, and it stands to reason if it happened once, it could happen again?"

Bruce decided to take the optimist route, so that horrible shattered look would leave Tony's face. "Well knowing you and your nature, if he had been sent to the future, he would have been driven to use his DNA and find his family, then worked or conned his way into SHIELD to either meet you or find the Tesseract and somehow join you now. So then, we can say with a good deal of certainty that he is somewhere in the past. Now, the better question is what do you want to do about it?"

"That's what I thought, too. I know there is an answer, and that the answer is staring me in the face, but I'm pretty sure my coffee fumes aren't going to do much more for me." They shuffled out the lab door and took the meandering pathway towards the kitchen, tossing ideas back and forth. "We've seen the Tesseract open a portal towards another dimension, so it looks like he could be literally anywhere. That sort of power implies an easy transport to as far back and as far away as we can imagine."

"Yes, but you're forgetting our example. Schmidt only traveled, what, 65 or 70 years? Factoring in the mass of your brother in comparison—we'll say Schmidt was maybe 80 kilograms, and your brother was closer to 10. So, an eighth of the energy, but all of the research you dug up, the theories say it takes around four times as much energy to travel backwards. So, we can bracket ourselves to the last… 150 years, rounding up. Hey Thor," Bruce maneuvered around the bulky god and attempted to claim the coffee pot.

"Wait. Wait wait, wait, wait. Thor, your people created the Tesseract, right?" At Thor's nod, Tony started bouncing on his toes. "Theoretically, could you find someone in a different time?" Thor gave Bruce a confused look at the non sequitur, but answered Tony anyways.

"My people long ago discovered the secrets of the so-called time travel. Is there something the matter, friend Stark?"

"Would it be possible to find someone in a different time who had interacted with the cube?"

"I suppose I could, yes."

"Then, Thor, you should definitely help me find my brother!"

"Man of Iron, your brother wouldn't be in a separate timeline, separated from you by the force of the Tesseract would he?"

Bruce grinned at that. "I told them you weren't as stupid as you look!"

"Ah, thank you? Well, I would be happy to find your brother, but then what shall you do? I am no sorcerer, and travel through the timestream is something only the greatest of magicians attempt."

Bruce fought back the urge to break the nearest object (the oft abused coffee maker). Tony's face had That Focused Look.

Bring on the horrible violin screeches.

* * *

It took another month before Tony's newest invention was ready for the testing phase. It was a glass and steel monstrosity, awkward and clunky and ready to take a passenger or five to a different time and place. Powered by the Tesseract and based in part on a few helpful scrolls Thor just "happened" to have in his pocket when he last arrived from Asgard, the time machine needed only a short test trip before the three men set off for parts unknown.

Tony's SHIELD database hacking, Thor's charming interrogation, and Bruce's misleading comments ensured their first trip was both a success and completely unremarkable to the tower's other occupants. They carefully placed Cap's birthday present in his room, so he would see it as soon as Hawkeye brought him back from a reconnaissance mission in Brazil later that evening.

"Alright Thor, what do you need to do? If it helps, we're assuming that he is somewhere in the 150 years before I was born; most likely in the 1800s, since landing any closer to the correct time, his physical similarity to a widely known family would have been noticed."

"H-Dad's journals said we were identical twins, too—that should make it easier to know for sure who we are looking for."

"Indeed, that will make the entire process much simpler. I shall endeavor to find your brother quickly, Man of Iron. I will return shortly," Thor took a deep breath, and launched off the roof of Starkvengers Tower. A brutal thunderstorm rolled over the previously clear sky, and Bruce and Tony huddled anxiously beneath a ledge. What felt like hours but was really just short of fifteen minutes later, Thor touched down with an anxious look on his face. "I have found your brother, but there is something wrong… he was injured, though not mortally, when suddenly he disappeared from my sight. Some danger lurks in hiding, we must go now!"

Tony, on edge since the entire saga began, launched himself into the Iron Man suit and flew down to the thirtieth floor, blasting out the window of his own lab to get to his time machine. Thor, holding on to a disgruntled Bruce, arrived seconds later.

"Where and when, Thor? And I probably should have asked this first, but do we need reinforcements?"

Shaking his head, Thor strapped himself awkwardly into the machine. "No reinforcements, I think, although a few medical supplies would not go amiss, Dr. Banner. The place was covered in ice and snow—Reichenbach Falls, in the realm of Switzerland. The year was 1891, on the evening of December the 16th. I am certain." Tony grappled with the control panel, turning knobs and flicking switches until, with a jolt and a bang of displaced air, the lab was left empty.

Darcy, having heard the bang, grabbed her taser and was greeted by the empty window frames. She kicked the wall and sat down with a huff, putting in the call to maintenance to "fix the windows; they've got a Tony shaped hole in them again!"

* * *

The machine landed at an angle, tilting it's passengers towards the icy waters below. The three men climbed carefully out before Thor carefully pulled their only way home to a less dangerous position, several feet from the ledge. Tony had zipped off, skirting the edges of the deep pool at the base of the falls as he searched, while Bruce started a fire and took stock of the lab's first aid kit (it was unsurprisingly thorough).

"THOR! COME GET THE OTHER ONE!" Tony's mechanical voice shouted as he raced back over to the impromptu camp. Bruce tried not to look too hard at the nearly perfect copy of Tony, bleeding out on the ground in front of him, and slipped into professional mode to wrap up his wounds as a silent Iron Man handed over bandages and antibacterial ointment as necessary. Assuming this man fell from the brightly lit building several hundred feet above them, he considered them all lucky that the worst of the injuries were a fractured wrist and a concussion, although Bruce puzzled for several moments over the grisly wounds in the shoulder area.

The second man, an older man with a beard who reminded Bruce uncomfortably of an old calculus professor, had an ugly head wound and was already too pale and too cold. Shaking his head, Bruce silently wished they had arrived just a few minutes earlier so they could have gotten this mysterious stranger some much needed medical assistance. As it was, he gently drew a blanket over the body, and turned back to the eerie sight of two silent Tonys.

Carefully, Thor lifted the unconscious brother into the time machine, as Bruce bullied Tony into turning his suit back into a briefcase and sitting quietly in the seat. Grateful he had the forethought to learn how to pilot the strange machine, he brought them safely back to Starkvenger Tower in the midst of a window replacement. Darcy, ever the cool and collected politician, glared at them and continued shouting at maintenance for mixing up some of Jane's and Bruce's notes.


	5. Chapter 5

Epilogue (5/5)

"_Tony! There is a ghost in my room! HELP!_" The Captain ran into the living room, glancing askance at the bruised and beaten Iron Man, quietly reading a book. "Did you get a haircut…? No! Tony, why is there a ghost in my room?"

Tony continued to stare blankly at the Captain, until JARVIS interrupted, causing both men to jump. "Sir, this is Captain Steve Rogers, one of Mr. Stark's team mates. Captain, this is Mr. Sherlock Holmes."

"Yes JARVIS, I had quickly ascertained the identity of this guest, I was only attempting to determine the exact method and reason as to his finding a ghost in his room."

JARVIS gave a long suffering sigh. "Certainly sir, I'll not bother you again."

Tony—the real one?—arrived from the labs on the floor below, talking loudly on his phone. "Honestly Pepper, how difficult can it be? We'll just throw our weight around until they acknowledge that yes, it is possible to find someone after forty-ish years." His face contorted into a strange little grimace. "Screw the rules, I have money!" He turned a bit sheepish, "But Peeeepperrrr, it's funny!"

Steve sat down, hard, on the couch. "Oh. I must be going crazy. Why else would Tony's twin brother be the imaginary detective Sherlock Holmes? Let alone that Peggy Carter is ASLEEP IN MY BED." Tony, who had stopped arguing with Pepper, sidled up to Steve.

"But don't you liiiiiike your birthday present?" He giggled—yes, giggled—as Steve's face turned scarlet.

* * *

Hawkeye perched in the air vents, conveniently enlarged during the last remodel of Starkvenger Tower, and waited for his prey. Tony, looking much scruffier than normal, rounded the corner, uncharacteristically quiet with a non-computerized book in his hand. Quick as a flash, Hawkeye shimmied out of the air vent and dropped nearly silently to the ground behind Tony, slinking up behind him for Scare Attempt Number 95.

_First, evade the strike. Second, dislodge arm from shoulder to prevent retaliation. Third, use dislocated arm to create untenable escape. Last, incapacitate with book. Probable chance of recovery, full. Probable cooperation in interrogation, 87%._

Holmes stared at the would-be assassin, lying crumpled on the ground at his feet. It appeared that Tony had more than a few enemies to contend with, although none so devious as M—

The Black Widow glared at the unconscious Tony, murderous rage threatening to overcome her good sense. It would be unwise to destroy the man in his own home, she reflected, rolling Hawkeye's arm back into its socket with a sickening pop, but questioning is certainly in order. Dragging both men into a nearby conference room, she locked the door and set about tying Tony to a seat with various belts and shoe laces, a scarf, and her emergency handcuffs. Relieved that she had not yet removed her gear, she dug into her pack for a bottle of water and an aspirin, waking up Hawkeye to stand guard.

She considered the possibility that another villain had brought back the brainwashing plot, and discarded it just as quickly. How many chances would there be to beat up on Stark without consequence?

"Clint! Natasha! Open up!" Tony started moving around at that, but having been gagged by Natasha, was unable to make his presence known.

"JARVIS, override code 01-30-19-95, passphrase Shit's Going Down!" Clint, who was close enough to the door to recognize the voice, was suddenly very, very confused.

"Tasha, I don't think that's—" the door opened with a horrific crunch, revealing Bruce and Tony. Another one. Confident that Clint would explain to their teammates the how and the why of the current situation, with fists applied as necessary, Natasha was too busy reaming out the Tony tied to the chair to notice the Tony at the door.

"What are you doing to my brother?!" Clint, lost between the oh-fuck-not-another-one feeling the Captain was familiar with, and the oh-fuck-this-is-going-to-be-awesome feeling of mischief, could only stare in disbelief as Tony stalked over to Tony and started untying himself. "You got taken down by the Black Widow!" Rescuer-Tony crowed to Captured-Tony, who rolled his eyes. Finally removing the gag, Captured-Tony took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. He examined Hawkeye, Widow, and his bruised wrists before speaking.

"I apologize, Hawkeye, I believed you harbored some ill will for my brother here, and as such I felt the need to take steps to neutralize the threat. And to you, Miss Romanoff, I believe I have offended you for which I am most certainly very, very sorry."

Natasha's eyebrow rose, seemingly of its own accord. Apparently, somewhere there existed a gentleman version of Tony.

* * *

Mary Watson opened the door to 221B so she could slam it in the face of the idiot man on the doorstep. Slowly, she walked into the living room and looked at John. "There is a man at our door who should be dead, and I am going to drink tea with Mrs. Hudson until I no longer have double vision." The exasperated, irritated look on her face told the Doctor everything he needed to know.

"Holmes?" he asked, opening the door quickly. Getting a good look at the man (men?) at his front door, he slammed the door again. "I refuse. No, no no, no. No more insanity, no more ridiculous adventures, no more migraines, and for the love of God Holmes," he started yelling, opening the door again, "Why are there two of you?"

Cackling evilly, Tony nudged Sherlock in the door. "Told ya it would be hilarious. Are you suuuure I can't tell them about the you-know-what?"

Ignoring his brother, Sherlock strode into the apartment as though he still lived there. "My good man, this is appalling! Where is my research? And what," his face wrinkled into a disgusted sort of pout as he held up one of Mary's older attempts at knitted blankets, "is this nonsense?"

They poked and prodded at Watson as they explained that Holmes had found his birth family, and would frequently be out of contact working as a consultant for a highly secretive group dealing in large scale Solutions, but would stop by at least every year to visit. Watson accused him of stoking his ego and reading too deeply into rumors of the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, but was overall pleased that the reports of Holmes' demise last month were somewhat... exaggerated (and that, hopefully, Holmes taking a job far away with visits coming few and far between would allow him to finally settle down with his wife).

"Darling," Mary entered the room, point blank refusing to look at the nearly identical men sitting on the couch, "Inspector Lestrade is here, he wants your help on closing out a case..."

Sherlock and Tony both give an identical grin, and Watson shivered a bit before sitting back to watch them destroy Lestrade.

* * *

"Stark, I have had it with your infantile pranks and continuous need to get in my way. I am beginning to regret ever telling you how to solve your battery life issues!"

"But Fury, he can help us figure out what the baddies are doing, and he can already beat the crap out of Hawkeye—let's make him an Avenger! We can be like the Hardy boys, except Badass!"

Fury crossed his arms and fought the urge to throw Stark out the window. The helicarrier was over water; no one would ever notice… "Give me one good reason I should keep you around instead of wiping your memories and dropping you off on a deserted island."

"Rogers!" The door opened, and the Captain entered looking suspicious and mischievous (a dangerous combination).

"Stark, the Captain has nothing to do with this, stop dragging everyone else into your daily drama—good morning, Director Carter, ma'am!"

"At ease, Fury," said a grinning Peggy Carter, taking the arm of a laughing Steve Rogers. "This gentleman was kind enough to bring me to a much more… useful point in time, and I believe, due to the nature of my disappearance, that my status is still in limbo? As such, I request immediate reactivation, and reassignment to the Avengers Initiative. Oh, don't look so worried! I don't want your job anymore," she reached out and patted Fury's shoulder. He turned away from Stark, grinned at Peggy, and forced his face back into the normal scowl before addressing the devious billionaire again.

"Anything else I need to know about Stark? Broken into government computer systems, blew up another enemy military encampment, brought someone back from the dead with no way to explain how?" Stark just grinned evilly, and motioned to Rogers to open the door again.

"Stark, you _didn't_. I almost like you now, so I am giving you ten seconds to get out of my face before my desire to punish you outweighs my relief at having my best operative back." He couldn't help it. The second the door closed, Fury burst into laughter, and Coulson cracked a wide grin. "That crazy fucker!"

The End?


End file.
